However, these changes don't happen without the efforts of committed and compassionate citizens across the country. Their voices--when raised in unison, with authority, and with fearlessness--can effect change most significantly.

With nowhere to go and no way to pass the hours at SeaWorld, captive orcas often gnaw on the concrete and iron-bar tank separators, sometimes breaking their teeth and leaving the pulp exposed and painfully raw.

If we are going to change the world to save ourselves, we have to save the ocean; and if we are going to save the ocean we have to start by saving the cetaceans. We have to protect their habitat and ensure that all marine life can thrive, so that we can too.

By examining orcas in the wild and their lives in sea parks, Blackfish makes a compelling argument that not only is it immoral to imprison orcas, but that they are too powerful, smart, and unpredictable for us to do it safely.

It's been four years since The Cove -- and 20 years since Free Willy. And yet, as the upsetting new documentary, Blackfish, shows, man's inhumanity to mammals continues unabated -- as commercialized and heartless as ever, even when it includes collateral damage.

Even as SeaWorld and OSHA engage in settlement talks over the 2010 death of orca trainer Dawn Brancheau, the company has suffered a legal setback in its fight to keep OSHA inspectors from interviewing trainers about federally mandated safety measures before the mediation process concludes.

SeaWorld San Diego is celebrating the birth of a killer whale on this Valentine's Day backstage at Shamu Stadium. But not everyone is delighted with the news. Anti-captivity activists say the newborn has a hard life ahead in a grotesquely unnatural world.

A new poll just out this morning, the first-ever survey of US public opinion on attitudes toward keeping killer whales in captivity, does not bear good news for the marine mammal industry, and in particular SeaWorld.

The week of July 16 will be crunch time for America's favorite marine theme park, as SeaWorld braces for the next grueling phase in the aftermath of orca trainer Dawn Brancheau's death, two and a half years ago in Orlando.